BC,

I respect your opinion but if you look at the LEGAL segregation and restrictions that Black people faced in their OWN country in the era and region where Ali was from, it wouldn't surprise you that the message of the N.O.I. resonated with many of them.

The modern civil rights era was actually spearheaded by Black veterans of WW1 and WW2 who proudly fought for their country against "tyranny" and then Nazism..and then came home to legalized jim crow race based segregation and discrimination. Many Black vets were lynched in their uniforms in the South for being "uppity" and actually thinking that they deserved to be treated as human beings in THEIR country. They were lynched in uniform to make a point...and of course..even as war vets....their families had NO legal recourse in their OWN country.

This is the world that Ali was born into in 1940s Kentucky.



Anyway, not sure when...but Ali left the NOI and converted to Sunni Islam at some point and rejected the race based teachings of the Nation of Islam.